The Free City of Danzig (german: Freie Stadt Danzig; pl, Wolne Miasto Gdańsk; csb, Wòlny Gard Gduńsk) was a

city-state A city-state is an independent sovereign city which serves as the center of political, economic, and cultural life over its contiguous territory. They have existed in many parts of the world since the dawn of history, including cities such as ...

under the protection of the

League of Nations The League of Nations (french: link=no, Société des Nations ) was the first worldwide intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. It was founded on 10 January 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference that ...

between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain. The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from ...

port of Danzig (now

Gdańsk Gdańsk ( , also ; ; csb, Gduńsk;Stefan Ramułt, ''Słownik języka pomorskiego, czyli kaszubskiego'', Kraków 1893, Gdańsk 2003, ISBN 83-87408-64-6. , Johann Georg Theodor Grässe, ''Orbis latinus oder Verzeichniss der lateinischen Benen ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

) and nearly 200 other small localities in the surrounding areas.

Overview

The polity was created on 15 November 1920 in accordance with the terms of Article 100 (Section XI of Part III) of the 1919

Treaty of Versailles The Treaty of Versailles (french: Traité de Versailles; german: Versailler Vertrag, ) was the most important of the peace treaties of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June ...

after the end of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. In line with the treaty provisions, the entity was established under the oversight of the

. Although predominantly German-populated, the territory was bound by the imposed union with Poland covering foreign policy, defence,

customs Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting tariffs and for controlling the flow of goods, including animals, transports, personal effects, and hazardous items, into and out of a country. Traditionally, customs ...

, railways and post, while remaining distinct from both the post-war German Republic and the newly independent Polish Republic. In addition, Poland was given certain rights pertaining to port facilities in the city. In the 1920 Constituent Assembly election, the

Polish Party The Polish Party (german: Polnische Partei) was a political party in the German Empire and the Free City of Danzig. Representing the Polish population in Germany, it was the largest of the minority parties. History The party had its origins in ...

received over 6% of the vote, but its percentage of votes later declined to about 3%. In 1921, Poland began to develop the city of

Gdynia Gdynia ( ; ; german: Gdingen (currently), (1939–1945); csb, Gdiniô, , , ) is a city in northern Poland and a seaport on the Baltic Sea coast. With a population of 243,918, it is the List of cities in Poland, 12th-largest city in Poland and ...

, then a midsized fishing town. This completely new port north of Danzig was established on territory awarded in 1919, the so-called

Polish Corridor The Polish Corridor (german: Polnischer Korridor; pl, Pomorze, Polski Korytarz), also known as the Danzig Corridor, Corridor to the Sea or Gdańsk Corridor, was a territory located in the region of Pomerelia (Pomeranian Voivodeship, eastern ...

. By 1933, the commerce passing through Gdynia exceeded that of Danzig. Notwithstanding this, Poland refused to relinquish trading and other rights awarded to it, further alienating the Danzigers. By 1936, the city's senate had a majority of local

Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...

, and agitation to rejoin Germany was stepped up. Many Jews fled from German

antisemitism Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

, persecution, and oppression. In 1938, the Free City's population of 410,000 was 98% German, 1% Polish and 1% other."Encyclopaedia Britannica Year Book for 1938", pp. 193–194.Zapiski historyczne: Volume 60, p. 256, ''Towarzystwo Naukowe w Toruniu.'' Wydział Nauk Historycznych – 1995 After the

German invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland (1 September – 6 October 1939) was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week afte ...

in 1939, the Nazis abolished the Free City and incorporated the area into the newly formed of Danzig-West Prussia. The Nazis classified the Poles and Jews living in the city as subhumans, subjecting them to discrimination, forced labor, and extermination. Many were murdered at

Nazi concentration camps From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps, (officially) or (more commonly). The Nazi concentration camps are distinguished from other types of Nazi camps such as forced-labor camps, as well as concen ...

, including nearby

Stutthof Stutthof was a Nazi concentration camp established by Nazi Germany in a secluded, marshy, and wooded area near the village of Stutthof (now Sztutowo) 34 km (21 mi) east of the city of Danzig ( Gdańsk) in the territory of the Germ ...

(now

Sztutowo Sztutowo (; formerly german: Stutthof) is a village in Nowy Dwór Gdański County, within the Pomeranian Voivodeship of northern Poland. It is located about 38 km (24 mi) east of Gdańsk on the northeastern edge of the Vistula Delta, a ...

, Poland). Upon the city's capture in the early months of 1945 by the

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

and Polish troops, a significant number of German inhabitants perished during the ill-prepared and much over-delayed attempts of evacuation over the sea, while the remainder fled or were expelled. The city was fully reintegrated into Poland as a result of the

Potsdam Agreement The Potsdam Agreement (german: Potsdamer Abkommen) was the agreement between three of the Allies of World War II: the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Soviet Union on 1 August 1945. A product of the Potsdam Conference, it concerned th ...

, while members of the pre-war Polish ethnic minority started returning and new Polish settlers began to come. Gdańsk suffered severe underpopulation from these events and did not recover until the late 1950s.

Establishment

Periods of independence and autonomy

Danzig had an early history of independence. It was a leading player in the

Prussian Confederation The Prussian Confederation (german: Preußischer Bund, pl, Związek Pruski) was an organization formed on 21 February 1440 at Kwidzyn (then officially ''Marienwerder'') by a group of 53 nobles and clergy and 19 cities in Prussia, to oppose the a ...

directed against the Teutonic Monastic State of Prussia. The Confederation stipulated with the Polish king,

Casimir IV Jagiellon Casimir IV (in full Casimir IV Andrew Jagiellon; pl, Kazimierz IV Andrzej Jagiellończyk ; Lithuanian: ; 30 November 1427 – 7 June 1492) was Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1440 and King of Poland from 1447, until his death. He was one of the ...

, that the

Polish Crown The Crown of the Kingdom of Poland ( pl, Korona Królestwa Polskiego; Latin: ''Corona Regni Poloniae''), known also as the Polish Crown, is the common name for the historic Late Middle Ages territorial possessions of the King of Poland, includ ...

would be invested with the role of head of state of western parts of Prussia (

Royal Prussia Royal Prussia ( pl, Prusy Królewskie; german: Königlich-Preußen or , csb, Królewsczé Prësë) or Polish PrussiaAnton Friedrich Büsching, Patrick Murdoch. ''A New System of Geography'', London 1762p. 588/ref> (Polish: ; German: ) was a ...

). In contrast,

Ducal Prussia The Duchy of Prussia (german: Herzogtum Preußen, pl, Księstwo Pruskie, lt, Prūsijos kunigaikštystė) or Ducal Prussia (german: Herzogliches Preußen, link=no; pl, Prusy Książęce, link=no) was a duchy in the region of Prussia establishe ...

remained a Polish fief. Danzig and other cities such as Elbing and

Thorn Thorn(s) or The Thorn(s) may refer to: Botany * Thorns, spines, and prickles, sharp structures on plants * ''Crataegus monogyna'', or common hawthorn, a plant species Comics and literature * Rose and Thorn, the two personalities of two DC Com ...

financed most of the warfare and enjoyed a high level of city autonomy. Danzig used the title ''Royal Polish City of Danzig''. In 1569, when Royal Prussia's estates agreed to incorporate the region into the

Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and, after 1791, as the Commonwealth of Poland, was a bi-confederal state, sometimes called a federation, of Crown of the Kingdom of ...

, the city insisted on preserving its special status. It defended itself through the costly Siege of Danzig in 1577 in order to preserve special privileges, and subsequently insisted on negotiating by sending emissaries directly to the Polish king. Danzig's location as a deep-water port where the

Vistula river The Vistula (; pl, Wisła, ) is the longest river in Poland and the ninth-longest river in Europe, at in length. The drainage basin, reaching into three other nations, covers , of which is in Poland. The Vistula rises at Barania Góra in ...

met the

had made it into one of the wealthiest cities in Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries as grain from

and

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

was shipped down the Vistula on barges to be loaded onto ships in Danzig, where it was shipped on to western Europe.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 211 As many of the merchants shipping the grain from Danzig were Dutch, who built Dutch-style houses for themselves, leading to other Danzigers imitating them, the city was thus given a distinctively Dutch appearance. Danzig become known as "the

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

of the East", a wealthy seaport and trading crossroads that linked together the economics of western and eastern Europe, and whose location at where the Vistula flowed into the Baltic led to various powers competing to rule the city. Although Danzig became part of the

Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (german: Königreich Preußen, ) was a German kingdom that constituted the state of Prussia between 1701 and 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Re ...

in the

Second Partition of Poland The 1793 Second Partition of Poland was the second of three partitions (or partial annexations) that ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The second partition occurred in the aftermath of the Polish–Russian War ...

in 1793, Prussia was conquered by

Napoleon Bonaparte Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...

in 1806, and in September 1807 Napoleon declared Danzig a semi-independent

client state A client state, in international relations, is a state that is economically, politically, and/or militarily subordinate to another more powerful state (called the "controlling state"). A client state may variously be described as satellite state, ...

of the French Empire, known as the

Free City of Danzig The Free City of Danzig (german: Freie Stadt Danzig; pl, Wolne Miasto Gdańsk; csb, Wòlny Gard Gduńsk) was a city-state under the protection of the League of Nations between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gda ...

. It lasted seven years, until it was re-incorporated into the

in 1814, after Napoleon's defeat at the

Battle of Leipzig The Battle of Leipzig (french: Bataille de Leipsick; german: Völkerschlacht bei Leipzig, ); sv, Slaget vid Leipzig), also known as the Battle of the Nations (french: Bataille des Nations; russian: Битва народов, translit=Bitva ...

(

Battle of Nations The Battle of Leipzig (french: Bataille de Leipsick; german: Völkerschlacht bei Leipzig, ); sv, Slaget vid Leipzig), also known as the Battle of the Nations (french: Bataille des Nations; russian: Битва народов, translit=Bitva ...

) by a coalition that included Russia, Austria, and Prussia. The city remained part of Prussia until 1920, becoming part of the ''Reich'' in 1871. Point 13 of U.S. president

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...

Fourteen Points U.S. President Woodrow Wilson The Fourteen Points was a statement of principles for peace that was to be used for peace negotiations in order to end World War I. The principles were outlined in a January 8, 1918 speech on war aims and peace terms ...

called for Polish independence to be restored and for Poland to have "secure access to the sea", a promise that implied that Danzig, which occupied a strategic location where the Vistula river flowed into the Baltic sea, should become part of Poland. At the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, the Polish delegation led by

Roman Dmowski Roman Stanisław Dmowski (Polish: , 9 August 1864 – 2 January 1939) was a Polish politician, statesman, and co-founder and chief ideologue of the National Democracy (abbreviated "ND": in Polish, "''Endecja''") political movement. He saw th ...

asked for Wilson to honor point 13 of the Fourteen Points by transferring Danzig to Poland, arguing that Poland would not be economically viable without Danzig and that since the city had been part of Poland until 1793, it was rightfully part of Poland anyway.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 211. However, Wilson had promised that national self-determination would be the basis of the Treaty of Versailles. As 90% of the people in Danzig in this period were German, the Allied leaders at the Paris Peace Conference compromised by creating the Free City of Danzig, a city-state in which Poland had certain special rights.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 218. It was felt that including a city that was 90% German into Poland would be a violation of the principle of

national self-determination The right of a people to self-determination is a cardinal principle in modern international law (commonly regarded as a '' jus cogens'' rule), binding, as such, on the United Nations as authoritative interpretation of the Charter's norms. It sta ...

, but at the same time the promise in the Fourteen Points of allowing Poland "secure access to the sea" gave Poland a claim on Danzig, hence the compromise of the Free City of Danzig. The Free City of Danzig was largely the work of British diplomacy as both the French Premier

Georges Clemenceau Georges Benjamin Clemenceau (, also , ; 28 September 1841 – 24 November 1929) was a French statesman who served as Prime Minister of France from 1906 to 1909 and again from 1917 until 1920. A key figure of the Independent Radicals, he was a ...

and U.S. President Woodrow Wilson supported the Polish claim to Danzig (Gdańsk), and it was only objections from the British Prime Minister

David Lloyd George David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during t ...

that prevented Danzig from going to Poland.Rothwell, Victor ''The Origins of the Second World War'', Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001 pp. 106–07. Despite creating the Free City, the British did not really believe in the viability of the Free City of Danzig with Lloyd George writing at the time: "France would tomorrow fight for Alsace if her right to it were contested. But would we make war for Danzig?" The Foreign Secretary

Arthur Balfour Arthur James Balfour, 1st Earl of Balfour, (, ; 25 July 184819 March 1930), also known as Lord Balfour, was a British Conservative Party (UK), Conservative statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1902 to 1905. As F ...

wrote in the summer of 1918 that the Germans had such a ferocious contempt for Poles that it was unwise for Germany to lose any territory to Poland even if morally justified as the Germans would never accept losing land to the despised Poles and such a situation was bound to cause a war.Rothwell, Victor ''The Origins of the Second World War'', Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001 p. 11. During the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, the British consistently sought to minimize German territorial losses to Poland under the grounds that the Germans had such an utter contempt for the Poles together with the rest of the Slavic peoples that such losses were bound to deeply wound their feelings and cause a war. For all the bitterness of the

French–German enmity French–German (Franco-German) enmity (french: Rivalité franco-allemande, german: Deutsch–französische Erbfeindschaft) was the idea of unavoidably hostile relations and mutual revanchism between Germans (including Austrians) and French peop ...

, the Germans had a certain grudging respect for the French that did not extend to the Poles at all. During the Paris Peace Conference, a commission of inquiry chaired by a British historian,

James Headlam-Morley Sir James Wycliffe Headlam-Morley, CBE (24 December 1863 – 6 September 1929) was a British academic historian and classicist, who became a civil servant and government advisor on current foreign policy. He was known as James Wycliffe Headlam unt ...

, investigating where the borders between Germany and Poland should be, started to research Danzig's history.Overy, Richard & Wheatcroft, Andrew ''The Road to War'', Random House: London 2009 p. 2. Upon discovering that Danzig had been a Free City in the past, Headlam-Morley came up with what he regarded as a brilliant compromise solution under which Danzig would become a Free City again that would belong to neither Germany nor Poland. As the British were opposed to Danzig becoming part of Poland and the French and the Americans to Danzig remaining part of Germany, Headlam-Morley's compromise of the Free City of Danzig was embraced. The rural areas around Danzig were overwhelmingly Polish and the representatives of the Polish farmers around Danzig complained about being included in the Free City of Danzig, stating they wanted to join Poland. For their part, the representatives of the German population of Danzig complained about being severed from Germany, and constantly demanded that the Free City of Danzig be reincorporated into the ''Reich''.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 219. The Canadian historian

Margaret MacMillan Margaret Olwen MacMillan, (born 1943) is a Canadian historian and professor at the University of Oxford. She is former provost of Trinity College, Toronto, and professor of history at the University of Toronto and previously at Ryerson Univer ...

wrote that a sense of Danzig national identity never emerged during the Free City's existence, and the German population of Danzig always regarded themselves as Germans who had been unjustly taken out of Germany. The loss of Danzig did indeed deeply hurt German national pride and in the interwar period, German nationalists spoke of the "open wound in the east" that was the Free City of Danzig.Overy, Richard & Wheatcroft, Andrew ''The Road to War'', Random House: London 2009 p. 16. However, until the building of

, almost all of Poland's exports went through Danzig, and Polish public opinion was opposed to Germany having a "choke-hold" on the Polish economy.

Territory

The Free City of Danzig (1920–39) included the city of Danzig (Gdańsk), the towns of Zoppot (Sopot), Oliva (Oliwa), Tiegenhof (Nowy Dwór Gdański), Neuteich (Nowy Staw) and some 252 villages and 63

hamlets A hamlet is a human settlement that is smaller than a town or village. Its size relative to a parish can depend on the administration and region. A hamlet may be considered to be a smaller settlement or subdivision or satellite entity to a lar ...

, covering a total area of 1,966 square kilometers (). The cities of Danzig (since 1818) and Zoppot (since 1920) formed independent cities (Stadtkreise), whereas all other towns and municipalities were part of one of the three rural districts (Landkreise),

Danziger Höhe The Danziger Höhe (i.e. Danzig Heights; Kreis Danziger Höhe) was an administrative district founded in 1887 and dissolved in 1939. The district administration was based in the City of Danzig, which itself did not form part of the district but w ...

, (both seated in Danzig city) and , seated in Tiegenhof. In 1928, its territory covered 1,952 km² including 58 square kilometers of freshwater surface. The border had a length of 290.5 km, of which the coastline accounted for 66.35 km.

Polish rights declared by Treaty of Versailles

The Free City was to be represented abroad by Poland and was to be in a

customs union A customs union is generally defined as a type of trade bloc which is composed of a free trade area with a common external tariff.GATTArticle 24 s. 8 (a) Customs unions are established through trade pacts where the participant countries set up ...

with it. The German railway line that connected the Free City with newly created Poland was to be administered by Poland, as were all rail lines in the territory of the Free City. On November 9, 1920, a convention that provided for the Presence of a Polish diplomatic representative in Danzig was signed between the Polish government and the Danzig authorities. In article 6, the Polish government undertook not to conclude any international agreements regarding Danzig without previous consultation with the Free City's government. A separate Polish post office was established, besides the existing

municipal A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

one.

League of Nations High Commissioners

Unlike

Mandatory Mandate most often refers to: * League of Nations mandates, quasi-colonial territories established under Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, 28 June 1919 * Mandate (politics) In representative democracies, a mandate (or seat) ...

territories, which were entrusted to member countries, the Free City of Danzig (like the

Territory of the Saar Basin The Territory of the Saar Basin (german: Saarbeckengebiet, ; french: Territoire du bassin de la Sarre) was a region of Germany occupied and governed by the United Kingdom and France from 1920 to 1935 under a League of Nations mandate. It had its ...

) remained directly under the authority of the League of Nations. Representatives of various countries took on the role of High Commissioner: Polish passport issued at Danzing, Gdansk

Polish passport issued at Danzing, Gdansk

The League of Nations refused to let the city-state use the term of ''

Hanseatic City The Hanseatic League (; gml, Hanse, , ; german: label=Modern German, Deutsche Hanse) was a medieval commercial and defensive confederation of merchant guilds and market towns in Central and Northern Europe. Growing from a few North German t ...

'' as part of its official name; this referred to Danzig's long-lasting membership in the

Hanseatic League The Hanseatic League (; gml, Hanse, , ; german: label=Modern German, Deutsche Hanse) was a medieval commercial and defensive confederation of merchant guilds and market towns in Central and Northern Europe. Growing from a few North German to ...

State Constabulary

Bundesarchiv Bild 102-14649, Danzig, Verhaftung am Wahltag

With the creation of the Free City in the

aftermath of World War I The aftermath of World War I saw drastic political, cultural, economic, and social change across Eurasia, Africa, and even in areas outside those that were directly involved. Four empires collapsed due to the war, old countries were abolished, ne ...

a security police force was created on 19 August 1919. On 9 April 1920, a military style marching band, the ''Musikkorps'', was formed. Led by composer Ernst Stieberitz, the police band became well known in the city and abroad. In 1921, Danzig's government reformed the entire institution and established the ''

Schutzpolizei The ''Schutzpolizei'' (), or ''Schupo'' () for short, is a uniform-wearing branch of the ''Landespolizei'', the state (''Land'') level police of the states of Germany. ''Schutzpolizei'' literally means security or protection police, but it is b ...

'', or protection police. Helmut Froböss became President of the Police (i. e.

Chief Chief may refer to: Title or rank Military and law enforcement * Chief master sergeant, the ninth, and highest, enlisted rank in the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Space Force * Chief of police, the head of a police department * Chief of the boa ...

) on 1 April 1921. He served in this capacity until the German

annexation Annexation (Latin ''ad'', to, and ''nexus'', joining), in international law, is the forcible acquisition of one state's territory by another state, usually following military occupation of the territory. It is generally held to be an illegal act ...

of the city. The police initially operated from 12 precincts and 7 registration points. In 1926 the number of precincts was reduced to 7. After the Nazi takeover of the Senate, the police were increasingly used to suppress free speech and political dissent. In 1933, Froböss ordered the left-wing newspapers ''Danziger Volksstimme'' and ''Danziger Landeszeitung'' to suspend publications for 2 months and 8 days respectively.HeinOnlin
15 League of Nations (1934)
(translated from German) By 1939, Polish-German relations had worsened and war seemed a likely possibility. The police began making plans to seize Polish installations within the city, in the event of conflict.
(in German) Ultimately the Danzig police participated in the

September Campaign The invasion of Poland (1 September – 6 October 1939) was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week after ...

, fighting alongside the local SS and the German Army at the city's Polish post office and at Westerplatte.Williamson, D. G
Poland Betrayed: The Nazi-Soviet Invasions of 1939
p. 66 Even though the Free City was formally annexed by

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

in October 1939, the police force more or less continued to operate as a law enforcement agency. The

Stutthof concentration camp Stutthof was a Nazi concentration camp established by Nazi Germany in a secluded, marshy, and wooded area near the village of Stutthof (now Sztutowo) 34 km (21 mi) east of the city of Danzig (Gdańsk) in the territory of the German-a ...

, 35 km east of the city, was run by the President of the police as an internment camp from 1939 until November 1941. Administration was finally dissolved when the city was occupied by the

Soviets Soviet people ( rus, сове́тский наро́д, r=sovyétsky naród), or citizens of the USSR ( rus, гра́ждане СССР, grázhdanye SSSR), was an umbrella demonym for the population of the Soviet Union. Nationality policy in th ...

in 1945.

Population

The Free City's population rose from 357,000 (1919) to 408,000 in 1929; according to the official census, 95% were

Germans , native_name_lang = de , region1 = , pop1 = 72,650,269 , region2 = , pop2 = 534,000 , region3 = , pop3 = 157,000 3,322,405 , region4 = , pop4 = ...

, with the rest mainly either

Kashubians The Kashubians ( csb, Kaszëbi; pl, Kaszubi; german: Kaschuben), also known as Cassubians or Kashubs, are a Lechitic ( West Slavic) ethnic group native to the historical region of Pomerania, including its eastern part called Pomerelia, in nort ...

Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, who share a common history, culture, the Polish language and are identified with the country of Poland in Ce ...

. According to E. Cieślak, the population registers of the Free City show that in 1929 the Polish population numbered 35,000, or 9.5% of the population. Henryk Stępniak estimates the 1929 Polish population as around 22,000, or around 6% of the population, increasing to around 13% in the 1930s. Based on the estimated voting patterns (according to Stępniak many Poles voted for the Catholic

Zentrumspartei The Centre Party (german: Zentrum), officially the German Centre Party (german: link=no, Deutsche Zentrumspartei) and also known in English as the Catholic Centre Party, is a Catholic political party in Germany, influential in the German Empire ...

instead of Polish parties), Stępniak estimates the number of Poles in the city to be 25–30% of Catholics living within it or about 30–36 thousand people. Including around 4,000 Polish nationals who were registered in the city, Stępniak estimated the Polish population as 9.4–11% of population.Ludność polska w Wolnym Mieście Gdańsku, 1920–1939, page 37, Henryk Stępniak, Wydawnictwo "Stella Maris", 1991, "Przyjmując, że Polacy gdańscy stanowili 25–30% ogólnej liczby ludności katolickiej Wolnego Miasta Gdańska, liczącej w 1920 r. około 110 000 osób, można ustalić, że w liczbach bezwzględnych stanowiło można ustalić, że w liczbach bezwzględnych stanowiło to 30- – 36 tyś. osób. Jeśli do liczby tej dodamy ok. 4 tyś. ludności obywatelstwa polskiego, otrzymamy łącznie ok. 9,4–11% ogółu ludności." In contrast Stefan Samerski estimates about 10 percent of the 130,000 Catholics were Polish. Andrzej Drzycimski estimates that Polish population at the end of 30s reached 20% (including Poles who arrived after the war). The

required that the newly formed state have its own citizenship, based on residency. German inhabitants lost their

German citizenship German nationality law details the conditions by which an individual holds German nationality. The primary law governing these requirements is the Nationality Act, which came into force on 1 January 1914. Germany is a member state of the Europ ...

with the creation of the Free City, but were given the right to re-obtain it within the first two years of the state's existence. Anyone desiring German citizenship had to leave their property and make their residence outside the Free State of Danzig area in the remaining parts of Germany.

Notable people born in the Free City of Danzig

Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-F034158-0018, Ausschnitt Eddi Arent

Portrat wolfgang voelz philipp von ostau

Eddi Arent Gebhardt Georg Arendt (5 May 1925 – 28 May 2013) was a German actor, cabaret artist and comedian. He appeared in more than 100 films between 1956 and 2002. He was born in Danzig, Free City of Danzig (present-day Gdańsk, Poland) and died in ...

(1925 in Danzig – 2013 in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

) was a German actor, cabaret artist and comedian. He appeared in 104 films between 1956 and 2002. * Ike Aronowicz (1923 in Danzig – 2009 Israel) captain of the immigrant ship SS ''Exodus'', which unsuccessfully tried to dock in

Mandatory Palestine Mandatory Palestine ( ar, فلسطين الانتدابية '; he, פָּלֶשְׂתִּינָה (א״י) ', where "E.Y." indicates ''’Eretz Yiśrā’ēl'', the Land of Israel) was a geopolitical entity established between 1920 and 1948 ...

with

Holocaust survivors Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and Axis powers, its allies before and during World War II in Europe and North Africa. There is no unive ...

on July 11, 1947 *

Elisabeth Becker Elisabeth Becker (20 July 1923 – 4 July 1946) was a Nazi Nazi concentration camps, concentration camp overseer in World War II. Life Becker was born in Nowy Staw, Neuteich, Free City of Danzig, Danzig (today Nowy Staw, Poland) to a German f ...

(1923 in Danzig – executed 1946 in Biskupia Górka) was a concentration camp guardStutthof Trial. Female guards in Nazi concentration camps Archived 2008
retrieved 21 October 2017 in World War II. *

Ingrid van Bergen Ingrid van Bergen (; born 15 June 1931) is a German film actress. She has appeared in 100 films since 1954. She was born in Free City of Danzig, today Gdańsk, Poland. Career Since 1954, Ingrid van Bergen appeared in more than 170 film and tele ...

(born 1931 in Danzig) is a German film actress. She has appeared in 100 films since 1954. Convicted of manslaughter in 1977 *

Miltiades Caridis Miltiades Caridis ( el, Μιλτιάδης Καρύδης; 9 May 1923 – 1 March 1998) was a German-Greek conductor. Biography Caridis was born in the Free City of Danzig (Gdańsk). His mother was a Danziger of German ethnicity, his father w ...

(1923 in Danzig – 1998 in Athens) was a German-Greek conductor, his family moved to Greece in 1938. *

Zygmunt Chychła Zygmunt Chychła (5 November 1926 – 26 September 2009) was a Polish boxer. He won the first post-World War II Olympic gold medal for Poland. Career In 1939 he began training at the Polish boxing club '' Gedania'', having started boxing at the ...

(1926 in Gdańsk – 2009 in Hamburg) was a Polish boxer. He won the

Olympic gold medal Olympic or Olympics may refer to Sports Competitions * Olympic Games, international multi-sport event held since 1896 ** Summer Olympic Games ** Winter Olympic Games * Ancient Olympic Games, ancient multi-sport event held in Olympia, Greece b ...

for

at the

1952 Summer Olympics The 1952 Summer Olympics ( fi, Kesäolympialaiset 1952; sv, Olympiska sommarspelen 1952), officially known as the Games of the XV Olympiad ( fi, XV olympiadin kisat; sv, Den XV olympiadens spel) and commonly known as Helsinki 1952 ( sv, Helsin ...

Anna M. Cienciala Anna Maria Cienciala (November 8, 1929 – December 24, 2014) was a Polish-American historian and author. She specialized in modern Polish and Russian history. Graduating with a history doctorate in 1962, she taught at two Canadian universities f ...

(1929 in Danzig – 2014 in Florida) was a

Polish-American Polish Americans ( pl, Polonia amerykańska) are Americans who either have total or partial Poles, Polish ancestry, or are citizens of the Republic of Poland. There are an estimated 9.15 million self-identified Polish Americans, representing abou ...

historian and author *

Holger Czukay Holger Schüring (24 March 1938 – 5 September 2017), known professionally as Holger Czukay (), was a German musician best known as a co-founder of the krautrock group Can. Described as "successfully bridg ngthe gap between pop and the avant-g ...

(1938 in Danzig – 2017 in Weilerswist) was a German musician, co-founder of the

krautrock Krautrock (also called , German for ) is a broad genre of experimental rock Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments ...

group Can *

Horst Ehmke Horst Paul August Ehmke (4 February 1927 – 12 March 2017) was a German lawyer, law professor and politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). He served as Federal Minister of Justice (1969), Chief of Staff at the German Chancellery and Fe ...

(1927 in Danzig – 2017 in Bonn) was a German lawyer, law professor and SPD politician, served as Federal Minister of Justice (1969) *

Jörg-Peter Ewert Jörg-Peter Ewert (born 1938 in the Free City of Danzig) is a German neurophysiologist and researcher in the field of Neuroethology. From 1973 to 2006, he served as a university professor (Chair of Zoology/Physiology) in the Faculty of Natural S ...

(born 1938 in Danzig) is a German neurophysiologist and researcher into

Neuroethology Neuroethology is the evolutionary and comparative approach to the study of animal behavior and its underlying mechanistic control by the nervous system. It is an interdisciplinary science that combines both neuroscience (study of the nervous syste ...

Günter Grass Günter Wilhelm Grass (born Graß; ; 16 October 1927 – 13 April 2015) was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature. He was born in the Free City of Da ...

(1927 in Danzig – 2015 in Lübeck) was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999

Nobel Prize in Literature ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , caption = , awarded_for = Outstanding contributions in literature , presenter = Swedish Academy , holder = Annie Ernaux (2022) , location = Stockholm, Sweden , year = 1901 , ...

. *

Ursula Happe Ursula Happe (; 20 October 1926 – 26 March 2021) was a German swimmer and Olympic champion. She competed at the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne, where she won the gold medal in 200 m breaststroke.1956 Summer Olympics The 1956 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XVI Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, from 22 November to 8 December 1956, with the exception of the equestrian events, whi ...

and won the gold medal in 200 m breaststroke *

Hans Albert Hohnfeldt Hans Albert Hohnfeldt (22 May 1897, in Neufahrwasser, Danzig – 31 July 1948) was a member of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) who served as ''Gauleiter'' in the Free City of Danzig and acting ''Gauleiter'' of Gau East Prussia. He also held other Party ...

(1897 in Neufahrwasser – 1948) Nazi Party ''

Gauleiter A ''Gauleiter'' () was a regional leader of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) who served as the head of a ''Administrative divisions of Nazi Germany, Gau'' or ''Reichsgau''. ''Gauleiter'' was the third-highest Ranks and insignia of the Nazi Party, rank in ...

'' in Danzig. *

Klaus Kinski Klaus Kinski (, born Klaus Günter Karl Nakszynski 18 October 1926 – 23 November 1991) was a German actor, equally renowned for his intense performance style and notorious for his volatile personality. He appeared in over 130 film roles in a c ...

(1926 in Zopot – 1991 in

Lagunitas, California Lagunitas (''Laguna'', Spanish for "Little lagoons") is an unincorporated community in Marin County, California. It is located southwest of Novato, at an elevation of 217 feet (66 m). For census purposes, Lagunitas is aggregated with Forest Kn ...

) was a controversial German actor. *

Wanda Klaff Wanda Klaff (6 March 1922 – 4 July 1946) was a Nazi concentration camp overseer. Klaff was born in Danzig to German parents as Wanda Kalacinski. She was executed for war crimes. Early life Wanda Kalacinski was the daughter of railway wor ...

(1922 in Danzig – executed 1946 in Biskupia Górka) was a Nazi camp overseer *

Heinz-Hermann Koelle Heinz-Hermann Koelle (22 July 1925, in Danzig, Free City of Danzig – 20 February 2011, in Berlin, Germany) was an aeronautical engineer who made the preliminary designs on the rocket that would emerge as the Saturn I. Closely associated wi ...

(1925 in Danzig – 2011 in Berlin) was an aeronautical engineer, made the preliminary designs for

Saturn I The Saturn I was a rocket designed as the United States' first medium lift launch vehicle for up to low Earth orbit payloads.Terminology has changed since the 1960s; back then, 20,000 pounds was considered "heavy lift". The rocket's first stag ...

Erhard Krack Erhard Krack (9 January 1931 – 13 December 2000) was a German politician and mayor of East Berlin from 1974 to 1990. Born in Danzig, he was a member of the Socialist Unity Party (SED). He was also a deputy in the Volkskammer __NOTOC__ T ...

(1931 in Danzig – 2000 in Berlin) was an

East German East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...

politician and mayor of

East Berlin East Berlin was the ''de facto'' capital city of East Germany from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945. The American, British, and French sectors were known as ...

from 1974 to 1990. *

Zdzisław Kuźniar Zdzisław Kuźniar (born 26 July 1931, in Free City of Danzig, now Gdańsk, Poland) is a Polish theater, film and television actor. Kuźniar graduated from the Ludwik Solski Academy for the Dramatic Arts in Kraków. That same year he debuted ...

(born 1931 in Gdańsk) is a Polish actor. *

Hanna-Renate Laurien Hanna-Renate Laurien (15 April 1928 – 12 March 2010) was a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU).CDU politician *

Jack Mandelbaum Jack Mandelbaum (born April 10, 1937 Janek or Jack) is a Holocaust survivor from the Free City of Danzig. His experiences as a boy during World War II were the subject of Andrea Warren's children's book of Mandelbaum surviving in a concentration ...

(born 1927 in Danzig) is a Holocaust survivor *

Rupert Neudeck Rupert Neudeck (; 14 May 1939 – 31 May 2016) was known for his humanitarian work, especially with refugees. He started his career as a noted correspondent for Deutschlandfunk, a German public broadcaster.Christoph Koch: Wie wird man eigentlich � ...

(1939 in Danzig – 2016 in Siegburg) correspondent for

Deutschlandfunk Deutschlandfunk (DLF, ''Broadcast Germany'') is a public-broadcasting radio station in Germany, concentrating on news and current affairs. It is one of the four national radio channels produced by Deutschlandradio. History Broadcasting in the ...

and founder of

Cap Anamur Cap Anamur is a humanitarian organisation with the goal of helping refugees and displaced people worldwide. In 1979, amidst the rising number of Vietnamese boat people fleeing Vietnam in unseaworthy crafts, Christel and Rupert Neudeck, toget ...

a humanitarian organisation * Zygmunt Pawłowicz (1927 in Danzig – 2010 in Gdańsk) ordained a Catholic priest in 1952, was the Polish Auxiliary bishop of the

Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Gdańsk The Archdiocese of Gdańsk ( la, Gedanen(sis)) is an archdiocese located in the city of Gdańsk in Poland. According to the church statistics Sunday mass attendance was 38.1% in 2013 making it lower than the Polish average of weekly mass atten ...

from 1985 until 2005 *

Avi Pazner Aviezer "Avi" Pazner (born 9 June 1937) is a retired Israeli diplomat and former World Chairman of Keren Hayesod - United Israel Appeal. Biography Avi Pazner was born in the Free City of Danzig (now Gdańsk). His father was Chaim Pazner, the ...

(born 1937 in Danzig) is a retired Israeli diplomat * Richard Pratt (1934 in Danzig – 2009 in Kew, Victoria) was a prominent Australian businessman, chairman of

Visy Visy Industries (known as Pratt Industries USA in the US) is an Australian-American company was established in Melbourne in 1948 and is a privately owned paper, packaging and recycling company. Visy was owned by Richard Pratt until his death ...

. His family moved to Australia in 1938 * Georg Preuß (1920 in Danzig – 1991 Clenze) was a mid-ranking commander in the

Waffen-SS The (, "Armed SS") was the combat branch of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts, volunteers and conscripts from both occup ...

, a convicted war criminal. * Meta Preuß (1903–1981) one of seven members of the

Communist Party (Free City of Danzig) The Communist Party in Danzig (present-day Gdańsk) was initially founded as a subdivision of the East Prussian section (''bezirk'') of the KPD. In 1921 a separate party branch of the KPD in the Free City of Danzig was set up. While the Party did ...

, elected to the

Volkstag The Volkstag (English: ''People's Diet'') was the parliament of the Free City of Danzig between 1919 and 1939. After World War I Danzig (Gdańsk) became a Free City under the protection of the League of Nations. The first elections to a const ...

in 1930. *

Henry Rosovsky Henry Rosovsky (September 1, 1927 – November 11, 2022)Marquis Who's Who Biographies, retrieved via LexisNexis Academic was an American economist and academic administrator who served as dean of the faculty of arts and science of Harvard Univers ...

(1927 in Danzig – 2022 in Cambridge, Massachusetts) was an economic historian, specializing in

East Asia East Asia is the eastern region of Asia, which is defined in both geographical and ethno-cultural terms. The modern states of East Asia include China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan. China, North Korea, South Korea and ...

, born of

Russian Jewish The history of the Jews in Russia and areas historically connected with it goes back at least 1,500 years. Jews in Russia have historically constituted a large religious and ethnic diaspora; the Russian Empire at one time hosted the largest pop ...

parents * Hermann Salomon (1938 in Danzig – 2020 in Mainz) was a German javelin thrower who competed in the

1960 It is also known as the "Year of Africa" because of major events—particularly the independence of seventeen African nations—that focused global attention on the continent and intensified feelings of Pan-Africanism. Events January * Ja ...

1964 Events January * January 1 – The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland is dissolved. * January 5 - In the first meeting between leaders of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches since the fifteenth century, Pope Paul VI and Patriarch ...

and the

1968 Summer Olympics The 1968 Summer Olympics ( es, Juegos Olímpicos de Verano de 1968), officially known as the Games of the XIX Olympiad ( es, Juegos de la XIX Olimpiada) and commonly known as Mexico 1968 ( es, México 1968), were an international multi-sport eve ...

Meir Shamgar Meir Shamgar ( he, מאיר שמגר; August 13, 1925 – October 18, 2019) was the chief justice of the Israeli Supreme Court from 1983 to 1995. Biography Meir Shamgar (Sterenberg or Sternberg) was born in the Free City of Danzig (present-da ...

(1925 in Danzig – 2019 in Jerusalem) was President of the

Israeli Supreme Court The Supreme Court (, ''Beit HaMishpat HaElyon''; ar, المحكمة العليا) is the Supreme court, highest court in Israel. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all other courts, and in some cases original jurisdiction. The Supreme C ...

1983–1995. *

Zalman Shoval Zalman Shoval ( he, זלמן שובל, born 28 April 1930) is an Israeli banker, politician and diplomat. He is also active in Israel's economic life. He was the Israeli ambassador to the United States in the years 1990–1993 and 1998–2000, a ...

(born 1930 in Danzig) is an Israeli politician and diplomat *

Wolfgang Völz Wolfgang Otto Völz (16 August 1930 – 2 May 2018) was a German actor. He is known for his roles in theatre plays, TV shows, feature films (especially German films based on Edgar Wallace works) and taped radio shows. He was also a very prolif ...

(1930 in Danzig – 2018 in Berlin) was a German actor, known for his roles in theatre plays, TV shows, feature films and taped radio shows *

F. K. Waechter Friedrich Karl Waechter (3 November 1937 in Danzig – 16 September 2005 in Frankfurt) was a renowned German cartoonist, author, and playwright. Life Waechter was born in Danzig as a son of a teacher. His family fled over the Baltic Sea af ...

(1937 in Danzig – 2005 in Frankfurt) was a German cartoonist, author and playwright

Religion

In 1924, 54.7% of the populace was

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

(220,731 persons, mostly

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

s within the

united United may refer to: Places * United, Pennsylvania, an unincorporated community * United, West Virginia, an unincorporated community Arts and entertainment Films * ''United'' (2003 film), a Norwegian film * ''United'' (2011 film), a BBC Two f ...

old-Prussian church), 34.5% was

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

(140,797 persons), and 2.4% Jewish (9,239 persons). Other Protestants included 5,604

Mennonite Mennonites are groups of Anabaptist Christian church communities of denominations. The name is derived from the founder of the movement, Menno Simons (1496–1561) of Friesland. Through his writings about Reformed Christianity during the Radic ...

s, 1,934

Calvinist Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Ca ...

s ( Reformed), 1,093

Baptist Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only (believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul compete ...

s, 410 Free Religionists, as well as 2,129

dissenter A dissenter (from the Latin ''dissentire'', "to disagree") is one who dissents (disagrees) in matters of opinion, belief, etc. Usage in Christianity Dissent from the Anglican church In the social and religious history of England and Wales, and ...

s, 1,394 faithful of other religions and denominations, and 664 irreligionists. The Jewish community grew from 2,717 in 1910 to 7,282 in 1923, and 10,448 in 1929, many of them immigrants from Poland and Russia.

Regional Synodal Federation of the Free City of Danzig

The mostly Lutheran and partially Reformed congregations situated in the territory of the Free City, which previously used to belong to the ''Ecclesiastical Province of West Prussia'' of the

Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union The Prussian Union of Churches (known under multiple other names) was a major Protestant church body which emerged in 1817 from a series of decrees by Frederick William III of Prussia that united both Lutheran and Reformed denominations in Pr ...

(EKapU), were transformed into the ''Regional

Synod A synod () is a council of a Christian denomination, usually convened to decide an issue of doctrine, administration or application. The word ''wikt:synod, synod'' comes from the meaning "assembly" or "meeting" and is analogous with the Latin ...

al Federation of the Free City of Danzig'' after 1920. The executive body of that ecclesiastical province, the

consistory Consistory is the anglicized form of the consistorium, a council of the closest advisors of the Roman emperors. It can also refer to: *A papal consistory, a formal meeting of the Sacred College of Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church *Consistory ...

(est. 1 November 1886), was seated in Danzig. After 1920 it was restricted in its responsibility to those congregations within the Free City's territory. General Superintendent (1920–1933) and Bishop (1933–1945) presided over the consistory, one after another. Unlike the

Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central Europe, Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 1918 and 1939. The state was established on 6 November 1918, before the end of ...

, which opposed the cooperation of the with EKapU, Volkstag and Senate of Danzig approved cross-border religious bodies. Danzig's Regional Synodal Federation — just as the regional synodal federation of the autonomous Memelland — retained the status of an ecclesiastical province within EKapU. After the German annexation of the Free City in 1939, the EKapU merged the Danzig regional synodal federation in 1940 into the Ecclesiastical Region of Danzig-West Prussia. This included the Polish congregations of the United Evangelical Church in Poland in the homonymous

Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia (german: Reichsgau Danzig-Westpreußen) was an administrative division of Nazi Germany created on 8 October 1939 from annexed territory of the Free City of Danzig, the Greater Pomeranian Voivodship (Polish Corridor), ...

and the German congregations in the West Prussia governorate. Danzig's consistory functioned as an executive body for that region. With the flight and expulsion of most ethnically German Protestant parishioners from the area of the Free City of Danzig between 1945 and 1948, the congregations vanished. In March 1945, the consistory had relocated to

Lübeck Lübeck (; Low German also ), officially the Hanseatic City of Lübeck (german: Hansestadt Lübeck), is a city in Northern Germany. With around 217,000 inhabitants, Lübeck is the second-largest city on the German Baltic coast and in the stat ...

and opened a refugee centre for Danzigers (Hilfsstelle beim evangelischen Konsistorium Danzig) led by Upper Consistorial Councillor . The Lutheran congregation of St. Mary's Church could relocate its valuable

parament Paraments or parements (from Late Latin ''paramentum'', adornment, ''parare'', to prepare, equip) are both the hangings or ornaments of a room of state, and the ecclesiastical vestments. Paraments include the liturgical hangings on and around ...

collection and the presbytery granted it on loan to St. Annen Museum in Lübeck after the war. Other Lutheran congregations of Danzig could reclaim their church bells, which the

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previous ...

had requisitioned as non-ferrous metal for war purposes since 1940, but which had survived, not yet melted down, in storage (e.g. ) in the British zone of occupation. The presbyteries granted them usually to Northwestern German Lutheran congregations which had lost bells due to the war.

Diocese of Danzig of the Roman Catholic Church

The 36 Catholic

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one or m ...

es in the territory of the Free City in 1922 used to belong in equal shares to the Diocese of Culm, which was mostly Polish, and the Diocese of Ermland, which was mostly German. While the Second Polish Republic wanted all the parishes within the Free City to form part of Polish Culm, Volkstag and Senate wanted them all to become subject to German Ermland. In 1922 the

Holy See The Holy See ( lat, Sancta Sedes, ; it, Santa Sede ), also called the See of Rome, Petrine See or Apostolic See, is the jurisdiction of the Pope in his role as the bishop of Rome. It includes the apostolic episcopal see of the Diocese of Rome ...

suspended the jurisdictions of both dioceses over their parishes in the Free State and established an exempt

apostolic administration An Apostolic administration in the Catholic Church is administrated by a prelate appointed by the pope to serve as the ordinary for a specific area. Either the area is not yet a diocese (a stable 'pre-diocesan', usually missionary apostolic admi ...

for the territory. The first apostolic administrator was

Edward O'Rourke Edward O'Rourke, full name Eduard Alexander Ladislaus Graf O'Rourke ( pl, Edward Aleksander Władysław O'Rourke; lv, Eduards O'Rurke; October 26, 1876 in Minsk – June 27, 1943) was a Roman Catholic priest, bishop of Riga and the first head ...

(born in

Minsk Minsk ( be, Мінск ; russian: Минск) is the capital and the largest city of Belarus, located on the Svislach and the now subterranean Niamiha rivers. As the capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is the admi ...

and of Irish ancestry) who became

Bishop of Danzig A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...

on the occasion of the elevation of the administration to an exempt diocese in 1925. He was naturalised as Danziger on the same occasion. In 1938 he resigned after quarrels with the Nazi-dominated Senate of Danzig on appointments of parish priests of Polish ethnicity. The senate also instigated the denaturalisation of O'Rourke, who subsequently became a Polish citizen. O'Rourke was succeeded by Bishop

Carl Maria Splett Carl Maria Splett (17 January 1898 – 5 March 1964) was a German Roman Catholic priest and Bishop of Danzig (Gdańsk); his role during World War II, especially as apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Culm, is controversial. After World War ...

, a native from the Free City area. Splett remained bishop after the German annexation of the Free City. In early 1941, he applied for admitting the Danzig diocese as member in Archbishop

Adolf Bertram Adolf Bertram (14 March 1859 – 6 July 1945) was archbishop of Breslau (now Wrocław, Poland) and a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. Early life Adolf Bertram was born in Hildesheim, Royal Prussian Province of Hanover (now Lower Saxony), ...

Eastern German Ecclesiastical Province {{unreferenced, date=April 2012 This list refers to the Roman Catholic dioceses and ecclesiastical provinces in Germany and the organisational changes between 1821 and 1994. The territorial changes through and after the Napoleonic Wars determined ...

and thus at the Fulda Conference of Bishops; however, Bertram, also speaker of the Fulda conference, rejected the request. Any arguments that the Free City of Danzig had been annexed to Nazi Germany did not impress Bertram since Danzig's annexation lacked international recognition. Until the reorganization of the Catholic dioceses in Danzig and the formerly eastern territories of Germany the diocesan territory remained unaltered and the see exempt. However, with the replacement of Danzig's population between 1945 and 1948 by mostly Catholic Poles, the number of Catholic parishes increased and most formerly Protestant churches were taken over for Catholic services.

Jewish Danzigers

Since 1883 most of the Jewish congregations in the later territory of Free State had merged into the Synagogal Community of Danzig. Only the Jews of Tiegenhof ran their own congregation until 1938. Danzig became a centre of Polish and Russian Jewish emigration to North America. Between 1920 and 1925 60,000 Jews emigrated via Danzig to the US and Canada. At the same time, between 1923 and 1929, Danzig's own Jewish population increased from roughly 7,000 to 10,500. Native Jews and newcomers established themselves in the city and contributed to its civic life, culture and economy. Danzig became a venue for international meetings of Jewish organisations, such as the convention of delegates from Jewish youth organisations of various nations, attended by

David Ben-Gurion David Ben-Gurion ( ; he, דָּוִד בֶּן-גּוּרִיּוֹן ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first prime minister of Israel. Adopting the name ...

, which founded the World Union of Jewish Youth on 2 September 1924 in the Schützenhaus venue. On 21 March 1926 the ''Zionistische Organisation für Danzig'' convened delegates of

Hechalutz HeHalutz or HeChalutz ( he, הֶחָלוּץ, lit. "The Pioneer") was a Jewish youth movement that trained young people for agricultural settlement in the Land of Israel. It became an umbrella organization of the pioneering Zionist youth moveme ...

from all over for the first conference in Danzig using

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

as common language, also attended by Ben Gurion. With a Nazi majority in the Volkstag and Senate, anti-Semitic persecution and discrimination occurred unsanctioned by the authorities. In contrast to Germany, which exercised capital outflow control since 1931, emigration of Danzig's Jews was nonetheless somewhat easier, with capital transfers enabled by the Bank of Danzig. Moreover, the comparatively few Danzig Jews were offered easier refuge in safe countries because of favorable Free City migration quotas. After the anti-Jewish riots of

Kristallnacht () or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from ...

of 9/10 November 1938 in Germany, similar riots took place on 12/13 November in Danzig. The Great Synagogue was taken over and demolished by the local authorities in 1939. Most Jews had already left the city, and the Jewish Community of Danzig decided to organize its own emigration in early 1939.Gdańsk
at the

Jewish Virtual Library Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...

Politics

Government

The Free City was governed by the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

of the Free City of Danzig, which was elected by the parliament (

) for a legislative period of four years. The official language was German, although the usage of Polish was guaranteed by law. The political parties in the Free City corresponded with the political parties in

Weimar Germany The Weimar Republic (german: link=no, Weimarer Republik ), officially named the German Reich, was the government of Germany from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a Constitutional republic, constitutional federal republic for the first time in ...

; the most influential parties in the 1920s were the conservative

German National People's Party The German National People's Party (german: Deutschnationale Volkspartei, DNVP) was a national-conservative party in Germany during the Weimar Republic. Before the rise of the Nazi Party, it was the major conservative and nationalist party in Wei ...

, the

Social Democratic Party of the Free City of Danzig The Social Democratic Party of the Free City of Danzig (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei der Freien Stadt Danzig) was a political party in the Free City of Danzig. After the creation of the Free City of Danzig in 1919, the Danzig branch of the S ...

and the

Catholic Centre Party The Centre Party (german: Zentrum), officially the German Centre Party (german: link=no, Deutsche Zentrumspartei) and also known in English as the Catholic Centre Party, is a Catholic political party in Germany, influential in the German Empire ...

. A

Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...

was founded in 1921 with its origins in the

Spartacus League The Spartacus League (German: ''Spartakusbund'') was a Marxism, Marxist revolutionary movement organized in Germany during World War I. It was founded in August 1914 as the "International Group" by Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht, Clara Zetkin, ...

and the Communist Party of

East Prussia East Prussia ; german: Ostpreißen, label=Low Prussian; pl, Prusy Wschodnie; lt, Rytų Prūsija was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1773 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 187 ...

. Several liberal parties and Free Voter's Associations existed and ran in the elections with varying success. A

represented the Polish minority and received between 3% ( 1933) and 6% (

1920 Events January * January 1 ** Polish–Soviet War in 1920: The Russian Red Army increases its troops along the Polish border from 4 divisions to 20. ** Kauniainen, completely surrounded by the city of Espoo, secedes from Espoo as its own ma ...

) of the vote (in total, 4,358 votes in 1933 and 9,321 votes in 1920). Initially, the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...

had only a small amount of success (0.8% of the vote in 1927) and was even briefly dissolved. Its influence grew with the onset of difficult economic times and the increasing popularity of the Nazi Party in Germany proper. Albert Forster became the

in October 1930. The Nazis won 50 percent of votes in the Volkstag elections of 28 May 1933, and took control of the Senate in June 1933, with

Hermann Rauschning Hermann Adolf Reinhold Rauschning (7 August 1887 – February 8, 1982) was a German politician and author, adherent of the Conservative Revolution movement who briefly joined the Nazi movement before breaking with it. He was the President of the ...

becoming President of the Senate of Danzig. Rauschning was removed from his position by Forster and replaced by

Arthur Greiser Arthur Karl Greiser (22 January 1897 – 21 July 1946) was a Nazi German politician, SS-''Obergruppenführer'', ''Gauleiter'' and ''Reichsstatthalter'' (Reich Governor) of the German-occupied territory of ''Wartheland''. He was one of the perso ...

in November 1934. He later appealed to the public not to vote for the Nazis in the 1935 elections. Political opposition to the Nazis was repressed with several politicians being imprisoned and murdered. The economic policy of Danzig's Nazi-led government, which increased the public expenditures for employment-creation programs and the retrenchment of financial aid from Germany led to a devaluation of more than 40% of the Danziger Gulden in 1935. The Gold reserves of the Bank of Danzig declined from 30 million Gulden in 1933 to 13 million in 1935 and the foreign asset reserve from 10 million to 250,000 Gulden. In 1935, Poland protested when Danzig's Senate reduced the value of the Gulden so that it would be the same as the

Polish zloty Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...

. As in Germany, the Nazis introduced laws mirroring the

Enabling Act An enabling act is a piece of legislation by which a legislative body grants an entity which depends on it (for authorization or legitimacy) the power to take certain actions. For example, enabling acts often establish government agencies to car ...

and

Nuremberg laws The Nuremberg Laws (german: link=no, Nürnberger Gesetze, ) were antisemitic and racist laws that were enacted in Nazi Germany on 15 September 1935, at a special meeting of the Reichstag convened during the annual Nuremberg Rally of th ...

(November 1938); existing parties and unions were gradually banned. The presence of the League of Nations however still guaranteed a minimum of legal certainty. In 1935, the opposition parties, except for the Polish Party, filed a lawsuit to the Danzig High Court in protest against the manipulation of the Volkstag elections. The opposition also protested to the League of Nations, as did the Jewish Community of Danzig. The number of members of the Nazi Party in Danzig increased from 21,861 in June 1934 to 48,345 in September 1938.

Foreign relations

Foreign relations were handled by

. In 1927, the Free City of Danzig sent a military advisory mission to

Bolivia , image_flag = Bandera de Bolivia (Estado).svg , flag_alt = Horizontal tricolor (red, yellow, and green from top to bottom) with the coat of arms of Bolivia in the center , flag_alt2 = 7 × 7 square p ...

. The Bolivian government of

Hernando Siles Reyes Hernando Siles Reyes (5 August 1882 – 23 November 1942) was a Bolivian politician who served as the 31st president of Bolivia from 1926 to 1930. The founder of the Nationalist Party, he soon gravitated toward the Saavedrista faction of t ...

wanted to continue the pre-

German military mission but the Treaty of Versailles prohibited that. The German officers, including

Ernst Röhm Ernst Julius Günther Röhm (; 28 November 1887 – 1 July 1934) was a German military officer and an early member of the Nazi Party. As one of the members of its predecessor, the German Workers' Party, he was a close friend and early ally ...

, were transferred to the Danzig police force and then sent to Bolivia. In 1929, after problems with the mission, the British embassy handled the return of the German officers.

German-Polish tensions

Nazi_World_War_II_poster_Danzig_is_German

The rights of the

within the territory of the Free City were stipulated in the

Treaty of Paris Treaty of Paris may refer to one of many treaties signed in Paris, France: Treaties 1200s and 1300s * Treaty of Paris (1229), which ended the Albigensian Crusade * Treaty of Paris (1259), between Henry III of England and Louis IX of France * Trea ...

of 9 November 1920 and the Treaty of Warsaw of 24 October 1921. The details of the Polish privileges soon became a permanent matter of disputes between the local populace and the Polish State. While the representatives of the Free City tried to uphold the city's autonomy and sovereignty, Poland sought to extend its privileges. Throughout the

Polish–Soviet War The Polish–Soviet War (Polish–Bolshevik War, Polish–Soviet War, Polish–Russian War 1919–1921) * russian: Советско-польская война (''Sovetsko-polskaya voyna'', Soviet-Polish War), Польский фронт (' ...

, local dockworkers went on strike and refused to unload ammunition supplies for the

Polish Army The Land Forces () are the land forces of the Polish Armed Forces. They currently contain some 62,000 active personnel and form many components of the European Union and NATO deployments around the world. Poland's recorded military history stret ...

. While the ammunition was finally unloaded by British troops, the incident led to the establishment of a permanent ammunition depot at the

Westerplatte Westerplatte is a peninsula in Gdańsk, Poland, located on the Baltic Sea coast mouth of the Dead Vistula (one of the Vistula delta estuaries), in the Gdańsk harbour channel. From 1926 to 1939, it was the location of a Polish Military Transi ...

and the construction of a trade and naval port in

, whose total exports and imports surpassed those of Danzig in May 1932. In December 1925, the Council of the

agreed to the establishment of a Polish military guard of 88 men on the

peninsula to protect the war material depot. During the interwar period the Polish minority was heavily discriminated against by the German population, which openly attacked its members using racist slurs and harassment, and attacks against the Polish consulate by German students were praised by authorities. In June 1932, a

crisis A crisis ( : crises; : critical) is either any event or period that will (or might) lead to an unstable and dangerous situation affecting an individual, group, or all of society. Crises are negative changes in the human or environmental affair ...

broke out when the Polish destroyer ORP ''Wicher'' was sent into Danzig harbour without the permission of the Senate to greet a visiting squadron of British destroyers.Wandycz, Piotr Stefan ''The Twilight of French Eastern Alliances'', Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988 p. 237 The crisis was resolved when the Free City granted more access rights to the Polish Navy in exchange for a promise to not take the ''Wicher'' back into Danzig harbour. Several disputes between Danzig and Poland occurred in the sequel. The Free City protested against the Westerplatte depot, the placement of Polish letter boxes within the City and the presence of Polish war vessels at the harbour. The attempt of the Free City to join the

International Labour Organization The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice by setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is the first and o ...

was rejected by the

Permanent Court of International Justice The Permanent Court of International Justice, often called the World Court, existed from 1922 to 1946. It was an international court attached to the League of Nations. Created in 1920 (although the idea of an international court was several cen ...

at the League of Nations after protests of the Polish ILO delegate. After Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, the Polish military doubled the number of 88 troops at Westerplatte in order to test the reaction of the new chancellor. After protests the additional troops were withdrawn. Nazi propaganda used these events in the

elections of May 1933, in which Nazis won absolute majority. Until June 1933, the High Commissioner decided in 66 cases of dispute between Danzig and Poland; in 54 cases one of the parties appealed to the Permanent Court of International Justice. Subsequent disputes were resolved in direct negotiations between the Senate and Poland after both had agreed to abstain from further appeals to the International Court in the summer of 1933 and bilateral agreements were concluded. In the aftermath of the German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact of 1934, Danzig–Polish relations improved and

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...

instructed the local Nazi government to cease anti-Polish actions. In return, Poland did not support the actions of the anti-Nazi opposition in Danzig. The Polish Ambassador to Germany,

Józef Lipski Józef Lipski (5 June 1894 – 1 November 1958) was a Polish diplomat and Ambassador to Nazi Germany from 1934 to 1939. Lipski played a key role in the foreign policy of the Second Polish Republic. Life Lipski trained as a lawyer, and joined th ...

, stated in a meeting with

Hermann Göring Hermann Wilhelm Göring (or Goering; ; 12 January 1893 – 15 October 1946) was a German politician, military leader and convicted war criminal. He was one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party, which ruled Germany from 1933 to 1 ...

"... that a National Socialist Senate in Danzig is also most desirable from our point of view, since it brought about a rapprochement between the Free City and Poland, I would like to remind him that we have always kept aloof from internal Danzig problems. In spite of approaches repeatedly made by the opposition parties, we rejected any attempt to draw us into action against the Senate. I mentioned quite confidentially that the Polish minority in Danzig was advised not to join forces with the opposition at the time of elections."

When Carl J. Burckhardt became High Commissioner in February 1937, both Poles and Germans openly welcomed his withdrawal, and Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs

Józef Beck Józef Beck (; 4 October 1894 – 5 June 1944) was a Poles, Polish statesman who served the Second Republic of Poland as a diplomat and military officer. A close associate of Józef Piłsudski, Beck is most famous for being Polish foreign minist ...

notified him not to "count on the support of the Polish State" in the case of difficulties with the Senate or the Nazi Party. While the Senate appeared to respect the agreements with Poland, the "Nazification of Danzig proceeded relentlessly" and Danzig became a springboard for anti-Polish propaganda among the German and Ukrainian minority in Poland. The Catholic Bishop of Danzig,

, was forced to withdraw after he had tried to implement four additional Polish nationals as parish priests in October 1937.

Danzig crisis

The German policy openly changed immediately after the

Munich Conference The Munich Agreement ( cs, Mnichovská dohoda; sk, Mníchovská dohoda; german: Münchner Abkommen) was an agreement concluded at Munich on 30 September 1938, by Nazi Germany, Germany, the United Kingdom, French Third Republic, France, and Fa ...

in October 1938, when German Minister of Foreign Affairs

Joachim von Ribbentrop Ulrich Friedrich Wilhelm Joachim von Ribbentrop (; 30 April 1893 – 16 October 1946) was a German politician and diplomat who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs of Nazi Germany from 1938 to 1945. Ribbentrop first came to Adolf Hitler's not ...

demanded the incorporation of the Free City into the Reich. The Polish ambassador to Germany, Jozef Lipski, declined Ribbentrop's offer, saying that Polish public opinion would not tolerate the Free City joining Germany and predicated that if Warsaw allowed that to happen, then the ''

Sanation Sanation ( pl, Sanacja, ) was a Polish political movement that was created in the interwar period, prior to Józef Piłsudski's May 1926 ''Coup d'État'', and came to power in the wake of that coup. In 1928 its political activists would go on ...

'' military dictatorship that had ruled Poland since 1926 would be overthrown. On 24 March 1939, the Polish Foreign Minister, Colonel

Jozef Beck Jozef or Józef is a Dutch, Breton, Polish and Slovak version of masculine given name Joseph. A selection of people with that name follows. For a comprehensive list see and .. * Józef Beck (1894–1944), Polish foreign minister in the 1930s ...

, who was part of the triumvirate which ruled the ''Sanation'' regime and largely ran foreign policy on his own, told a meeting of the Polish cabinet that Poland should go to war if Germany made any attempt to alter the status of Danzig. Beck stated that Danzig "regardless of what it is worth as an object" had become a "symbol" in Poland that was so important that Poland should go to war over the issue. Aside from the possibility that a revolution in Poland might overthrow the ''Sanation'' regime should it allow Danzig to be returned to Germany, Beck as part of his plans for a "Third Europe" (i.e. a block of Eastern European states under Polish leadership) had sought to develop economic relations with Sweden and Finland.Prazmowska, Anita "Poland, the 'Danzig Question', and the Outbreak of the Second World War" pp. 394–408 from ''The Origins of the Second World War'' edited by Frank McDonough, London: Continuum, 2011 p 402. Beck envisioned both Sweden and Finland joining the "Third Europe" block, and German plans to take back Danzig threatened to allow Germany a "choke-hold" on Poland's main link to the sea as the port facilities at Danzig were still better developed than those at Gdynia.

Ernst von Weizsäcker Ernst Heinrich Freiherr von Weizsäcker (25 May 1882 – 4 August 1951) was a German naval officer, diplomat and politician. He served as State Secretary at the Foreign Office of Nazi Germany from 1938 to 1943, and as its Ambassador t ...

on 29 March 1939 told the Danzig government the ''Reich'' would carry out a policy to the ''Zermürbungspolitik'' (point of destruction) towards Poland, saying a compromise solution was not wanted, and on 5 April 1939 told

Hans-Adolf von Moltke Hans-Adolf Helmuth Ludwig Erdmann Waldemar von Moltke (29 November 188422 March 1943) was a German landowner in Silesia who became a diplomat. He served as ambassador in Poland during the Weimar Republic. After the German invasion of Poland, he ...

under no conditions was he to negotiate with the Poles. On 31 March 1939, the British Prime Minister,

Neville Chamberlain Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician of the Conservative Party who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasemen ...

, announced in the House of Commons a "guarantee" of Polish independence, stating that Britain would go to war with Germany if there was an attempt to end Polish independence, though Chamberlain pointedly excluded the borders of Poland from the "guarantee". In April 1939, High Commissioner Burckhardt was told by the Polish Commissioner-General that any attempt to alter its status would be answered with armed resistance on the part of Poland. Beck had not abandoned hopes of negotiating a settlement with Germany.Prazmowska, Anita "Poland" pages 155–64 from ''The Origins of The Second World War'' edited by Robert Boyce and Joseph Maiolo, London: Macmillan, 2003 p. 161. During the spring and summer of 1939 it was the aim of

British foreign policy The diplomatic foreign relations of the United Kingdom are conducted by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, headed by the Foreign Secretary. The prime minister and numerous other agencies play a role in setting policy, and many ...

to build a "peace front" embracing Britain, France, the Soviet Union and a number of other European states such as Poland, Romania, Yugoslavia, Greece and Turkey with the aim of "containing" Germany. Beck made it clear that he wanted no Polish-Soviet treaty to go along with the British-inspired "peace front" since an alliance with the Soviets would rule out any possibility of a settlement with Germany, which he still had hopes of reaching. Beck declined to have Polish diplomats take part in the talks between British, French and Soviet diplomats about having the Soviet Union join the "peace front", and during a visit to London in April 1939 he declined British offers to create a military alliance of Britain, Poland and Romania designed to block the ''Reichs offers to expand its influence in Eastern Europe. The Polish historian Anita Prazmowska wrote that Beck's refusal of the British offers of assistance was partly due to his "inflated sense of self-importance and the general overestimation of Poland's military potential" as he believed that Poland was one of the world's great powers that could defeat Germany on its own, but also due to his desire not have Poland join the anti-German "peace front" at a time when he still believed that he could settle the Danzig issue. During his visit to London on 4–6 April 1939 Beck told Chamberlain that any effort to include the Soviet Union in the "peace front" would cause the very war it was supposed to prevent, and wanted to exclude the Soviet Union from the "peace front" for that reason. Before the Danzig crisis, the Polish General Staff had devoted far more time to planning a possible war with the Soviet Union rather than with Germany, and even after the Danzig crisis began, planning for a possible war with Germany went about in a rather haphazard and causal manner suggesting the Polish high command did not see war with Germany as very likely in 1939. On 5 May 1939, Beck in a speech broadcast on Polish radio stated that Poland wanted peace but that "peace...has its price, high but definable. We in Poland do not recognize the conception of peace at any price. There is only one thing..which is without price, and that is honor". All through the spring and summer of 1939 there was a massive media campaign in Germany demanding the immediate return of the Free City of Danzig to Germany under the slogan "Home to the ''Reich''!". However, the Danzig crisis was a just a pretext for war. Ribbentrop ordered Count

, the German ambassador to Poland, not to negotiate with the Poles over Danzig as it was always Ribbentrop's great fear that the Poles might actually agree to the Free City returning to Germany, thereby depriving the ''Reich'' of its pretext for attacking Poland. However, the German propaganda that all the ''Reich'' wanted was to bring Danzig home did some effect abroad. In April 1943, when mass graves of the Polish officers massacred by the

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (russian: Наро́дный комиссариа́т вну́тренних дел, Naródnyy komissariát vnútrennikh del, ), abbreviated NKVD ( ), was the interior ministry of the Soviet Union. ...

in Katyn Wood were discovered, the Canadian Prime Minister

William Lyon Mackenzie King William Lyon Mackenzie King (December 17, 1874 – July 22, 1950) was a Canadian statesman and politician who served as the tenth prime minister of Canada for three non-consecutive terms from 1921 to 1926, 1926 to 1930, and 1935 to 1948. A Li ...

wrote in his diary that it was the Poles who caused the outbreak of the war in 1939 by refusing to give in to Hitler's demand that Danzig be allowed to rejoin Germany, and as such it was the Poles' own fault for the Katyn Wood massacre and everything else they had suffered since 1939.Rothwell, Victor ''The Origins of the Second World War'', Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001 p. 108. The British historian Victor Rothwell described King's view that the Poles had caused their own suffering as one motivated by spite and his resentment at being pressured by public opinion into declaring war on Germany despite his own inclinations towards neutrality. From distant

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

, the Prime Minister

Michael Joseph Savage Michael Joseph Savage (23 March 1872 – 27 March 1940) was a New Zealand politician who served as the 23rd prime minister of New Zealand, heading the First Labour Government from 1935 until his death in 1940. Savage was born in the Colon ...

offered to return

Western Samoa Samoa, officially the Independent State of Samoa; sm, Sāmoa, and until 1997 known as Western Samoa, is a Polynesian island country consisting of two main islands ( Savai'i and Upolu); two smaller, inhabited islands ( Manono and Apolima); ...

, which had once been the colony of

German Samoa German Samoa (german: Deutsch-Samoa) was a German protectorate from 1900 to 1920, consisting of the islands of Upolu, Savai'i, Apolima and Manono, now wholly within the independent state of Samoa, formerly ''Western Samoa''. Samoa was the last ...

together with the rest of the former German islands in the Pacific held by New Zealand, in exchange for Germany promising not to use violence to alter the status of Danzig. However, in 1938, the ''Reich'' government had first demanded autonomy for the

Sudetenland The Sudetenland ( , ; Czech and sk, Sudety) is the historical German name for the northern, southern, and western areas of former Czechoslovakia which were inhabited primarily by Sudeten Germans. These German speakers had predominated in the ...

region and after Prague had conceded the demand for autonomy, had laid claim to the Sudetenland. On 15 March 1939, Germany had occupied the

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus' Places * Czech, ...

part of Czecho-Slovakia, which had done immense damage to Hitler's claim that he was only trying to undo an "unjust" Treaty of Versailles by bringing all of the ethnic Germans "home to the ''Reich''". The British Foreign Secretary

Lord Halifax Edward Frederick Lindley Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax, (16 April 1881 – 23 December 1959), known as The Lord Irwin from 1925 until 1934 and The Viscount Halifax from 1934 until 1944, was a senior British Conservative politician of the 19 ...

late in August 1939 told

Herbert von Dirksen Eduard Willy Kurt Herbert von Dirksen (2 April 1882 – 19 December 1955) was a German diplomat (and from 1936 when he joined the party, specifically a Nazi diplomat) who was the last German ambassador to Britain before World War II. Early lif ...

, the German ambassador in London:

“Last year the German government put forward the demand for the Sudetenland on purely racial grounds; but subsequent events proved that this demand was only put forward as a cover for the annihilation of Czechoslovakia. In view of this experience… it is not surprising that the Poles and we ourselves are afraid that the demand for Danzig is only a first move towards the destruction of Poland’s independence”.

Tensions escalated into the Danzig crisis during the summer of 1939. F.M Shepard, the British consul in Danzig, reported that the Danzig Nazis were bringing arms from Germany and building fortifications. In July 1939, the British government reluctantly extended its "guarantee" of Poland to the status of Free City of Danzig, stating a German attempt to take Danzig would be a ''

casus belli A (; ) is an act or an event that either provokes or is used to justify a war. A ''casus belli'' involves direct offenses or threats against the nation declaring the war, whereas a ' involves offenses or threats against its ally—usually one b ...

''. At the beginning of August, the Senate told Warsaw that henceforward the Free City would no longer recognize the authority of Polish customs officers in Danzig, which led Beck in response to warn that the Senate did not have the right to disregard the terms of the Treaty of Versailles and that the German government also did not have the right to speak for Danzig.Prazmowska, Anita "Poland, the 'Danzig Question', and the Outbreak of the Second World War" pp. 394–408 from ''The Origins of the Second World War'' edited by Frank McDonough, London: Continuum, 2011 p. 406. Much to the chagrin of the

British Foreign Office The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) is a department of the Government of the United Kingdom. Equivalent to other countries' ministries of foreign affairs, it was created on 2 September 2020 through the merger of the Foreign ...

, Warsaw did not consult Britain first when it issued a warning that the Polish Air Force would bomb Danzig if the authority of Polish customs officers continued to be ignored. The Senate backed down while the British who were informed after the fact of the Polish decision to confront the Free City were thrown into panic over the possibility of an armed clash in Danzig plunging Europe into war. The British ambassador to Poland, Sir

Howard William Kennard Sir Howard William Kennard GCMG, CVO (23 March 1878 – 12 November 1955) was a British diplomat. Early life Kennard was born on 23 March 1878 in Brighton, the son of Arthur Challis Kennard and Anne Homan Mulock, and educated at Wixenford Sch ...

, sought in vain for a promise from Colonel Beck that Poland would take no action in Danzig without first obtaining British approval. Beck disliked Kennard and kept him in the dark about what Poland would do if Danzig voted to rejoin Germany, but also about the state of German-Polish relations, much to the vexation of the Foreign Office. Adolf Hitler addresses an audience in Danzig 03

Adolf Hitler addresses an audience in Danzig 03

In the middle of August, Beck offered a concession, saying that Poland was willing to give up its control of Danzig's customs, a proposal which caused fury in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

.Rothwell, Victor ''The Origins of the Second World War'', Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001 p. 161. However, the leaders of the Free City sent a message to Berlin on 19 August 1939 saying: "''Gauleiter'' Forster intends to extend claims...Should the Poles yield again it is intended to increase the claims further in order to make accord impossible". The same day a telegram from Berlin expressed approval with the proviso: "Discussions will have to be conducted and pressure exerted against Poland in such a way that responsibility for failure to come to an agreement and the consequences rest with Poland". On 23 August 1939, Albert Forster, the ''Gauleiter'' of Danzig, called a meeting of the Senate that voted to have the Free City rejoin Germany, raising tensions to the breaking point. The same meeting appointed Forster the Danzig State President, through this was due to Forster's long-running rivalry with

, a ''völkisch'' fanatic who regarded Forster as too soft on the Poles. Both the appointment of Forster as State President and the resolution calling for the Free City to rejoin the ''Reich'' were violations of the charter the League of Nations had given Danzig in 1920, and the matter should have been taken to the League of Nations's Security Council for discussion. Since these violations of the Danzig charter would have resulted in the League deposing the Danzig's Nazi government, both the French and British prevented the matter from being referred to the Security Council. Instead the British and French applied strong pressure on the Poles not to send in a military force to depose the Danzig government, and appoint a mediator to resolve the crisis.Prazmowska, Anita "Poland, the 'Danzig Question', and the Outbreak of the Second World War" pp. 394–408 from ''The Origins of the Second World War'' edited by Frank McDonough, London: Continuum, 2011 p. 407. By late August 1939, the crisis continued to escalate with the Senate confiscating on 27 August 1939 stocks of wheat, salt and petrol that belonged to the Polish businesses that were in the process of being exported or imported via the Free City, an action that led to sharp Polish complaints. The same day, 200 Polish workers at the Danzig shipyards were fired without severance pay and their identification papers revoked, meaning that they legally could not live in Danzig anymore.Watt, D.C. ''How War Came'', London: Heinemann, 1989 p. 513. The Danzig government imposed food rationing, the Danzig newspapers took a militantly anti-Polish line, and almost every day there were "incidents" on the border with Poland. Ordinary people in Danzig were described as being highly worried in the last days of August 1939 as it become apparent that war was imminent. In the meantime, the German battleship ''

Schleswig-Holstein Schleswig-Holstein (; da, Slesvig-Holsten; nds, Sleswig-Holsteen; frr, Slaswik-Holstiinj) is the northernmost of the 16 states of Germany, comprising most of the historical duchy of Holstein and the southern part of the former Duchy of Sch ...

'' had arrived in Danzig on 15 August. Originally, it was planned to send the light cruiser ''

Königsberg Königsberg (, ) was the historic Prussian city that is now Kaliningrad, Russia. Königsberg was founded in 1255 on the site of the ancient Old Prussian settlement ''Twangste'' by the Teutonic Knights during the Northern Crusades, and was named ...

'' to Danzig for what was described as a "friendship visit", but it was decided at the last minute that a ship with more firepower was needed, leading to the ''Schleswig-Holstein'' with its guns being substituted. Upon anchoring in Danzig harbor, the ''Schleswig-Holstein'' ominously aimed its guns at the Polish Military Depot on the Westerplatte peninsula in a provocative gesture that further raised the tensions in the Free City. At about 4:48am on 1 September 1939, the ''Schleswig-Holstein'' opened fire on the Westerplatte, firing the first shots of World War II.

Second World War and aftermath

Bundesarchiv Bild 183-E10458, Polen, Zollstation, deutsche Soldaten

On 1 September 1939, the day of the German invasion of the Free City of Danzig, Foster signe
a law
declaring the Free City to be incorporated into Germany. On the same day, Hitler signe

declaring the law signed by Foster to be German law and the Free City of Danzig was officially incorporated into Germany. The Polish military forces in the city held out until 7 September. Up to 4,500 members of the Polish minority were arrested with many of them executed. In the city itself hundreds of Polish prisoners were subjected to cruel executions and experiments, which included castration of men and sterilization of women considered dangerous to the "purity of Nordic race" and beheading by

guillotine A guillotine is an apparatus designed for efficiently carrying out executions by beheading. The device consists of a tall, upright frame with a weighted and angled blade suspended at the top. The condemned person is secured with stocks at th ...

. The judicial system was one of the main tools of extermination policy towards Poles led by Nazi Germany in the city and verdicts were motivated by statements that Poles were subhuman. By the end of the Second World War, nearly all of the city had been reduced to ruins. On 30 March 1945, the city was taken by the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

. At the

Yalta Conference The Yalta Conference (codenamed Argonaut), also known as the Crimea Conference, held 4–11 February 1945, was the World War II meeting of the heads of government of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union to discuss the post ...

in February 1945, the

Allies An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

agreed that the city would become part of Poland. No formal treaty has ever altered the status of the Free City of Danzig, and its incorporation into Poland has rested upon the general acquiescence of the international community. In 1947, a Free City of Danzig Government in Exile was established. The expulsion of the pre-war inhabitants started already before the decisions of the

Potsdam conference The Potsdam Conference (german: Potsdamer Konferenz) was held at Potsdam in the Soviet occupation zone from July 17 to August 2, 1945, to allow the three leading Allies to plan the postwar peace, while avoiding the mistakes of the Paris Pe ...

of August 1945. From June to October an estimated number of 60,000 residents were expelled by Polish authorities, often units of the

Polish Armed Forces The Armed Forces of the Republic of Poland ( pl, Siły Zbrojne Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej, abbreviated ''SZ RP''; popularly called ''Wojsko Polskie'' in Poland, abbreviated ''WP''—roughly, the "Polish Military") are the national armed forces of ...

, the Polish State Security and the

Milicja Obywatelska Milicja Obywatelska (), in English known as the Citizens' Militia and commonly abbreviated to MO, was the national police organization of the Polish People's Republic. It was established on 7 October 1944 by the Polish Committee of National Libera ...

encircled certain areas and forced the inhabitants to make room for newly arrived Polish settlers. About 20,000 Germans left on their own and by late 1945 between 10,000 and 15,000 pre-war inhabitants remained. By 1950, around 285,000 fled and expelled citizens of the former Free City were living in Germany, and 13,424 citizens of the former Free City had been "verified" and granted Polish citizenship. By 1947, 126,472 Danzigers of German ethnicity were expelled to Germany from Gdańsk, and 101,873 Poles from Central Poland and 26,629 from

-annexed Eastern Poland took their place (these figures refer to the city of Gdańsk itself, not to the whole area of pre-war Free City).

Origin of the post-war population

During the Polish post-war census of December 1950, data about the pre-war places of residence of the inhabitants as of August 1939 was collected. In case of children born between September 1939 and December 1950, their origin was reported based on the pre-war places of residence of their mothers. Thanks to this data it is possible to reconstruct the pre-war geographical origin of the post-war population. The same territory which corresponded to pre-war Free City of Danzig was inhabited in December 1950 by: At least 85% of the population as of December 1950 were post-war newcomers, but over 10% of inhabitants were still pre-war Danzigers (most of them members of pre-war Polish and Kashubian minorities in the Free City of Danzig). Another 25% came from neighbouring areas of pre-war Polish Pomerania. Almost 20% were Poles from areas of former Eastern Poland annexed by the USSR (many from Wilno Voivodeship). Several percent came from the city of Warsaw, which had been largely destroyed in 1944.

In fiction

Historical Danzig is the setting for several works of

, including his

Danzig Trilogy The ''Danzig Trilogy'' (german: Danziger Trilogie) is series of novels and novellas by German author Günter Grass. The trilogy focuses on the interwar and wartime period in the Free City of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland). The three books in the t ...

novels ''

The Tin Drum ''The Tin Drum'' (german: Die Blechtrommel, ) is a 1959 novel by Günter Grass. The novel is the first book of Grass's ' (''Danzig Trilogy''). It was adapted into a 1979 film, which won both the 1979 Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for Best ...

'', ''

Cat and Mouse Cat and mouse, often expressed as cat-and-mouse game, is an English-language idiom that means "a contrived action involving constant pursuit, near captures, and repeated escapes." The "cat" is unable to secure a definitive victory over the "mouse ...

'' and '' Dog Years'', as well as in his memoirs. Grass grew up in the Danzig suburb of

Langfuhr Wrzeszcz (pronounced , german: Langfuhr; csb, Wrzészcz) is one of the boroughs of the Northern Polish city of Gdańsk. With a population of more than 65,000 in an area of (population density 6,622), Wrzeszcz is the most populous part of Gdańs ...

(now

Wrzeszcz Wrzeszcz (pronounced , german: Langfuhr; csb, Wrzészcz) is one of the boroughs of the Northern Poland, Polish city of Gdańsk. With a population of more than 65,000 in an area of (population density 6,622), Wrzeszcz is the most populous part o ...

References

External links

Extensive Prussian/ Danzig Historical Materials
(many in German)
Map of the Free City

Danzig Online

''Wanderlust'',

Salon.com ''Salon'' is an American politically progressive/ liberal news and opinion website created in 1995. It publishes articles on U.S. politics, culture, and current events. Content and coverage ''Salon'' covers a variety of topics, including re ...

, January 5, 1998. *
1933 Danzig passport
from passportland.com.
First hand account of growing up in Danzig in the 1930s
a video interview. {{DEFAULTSORT:Danzig, Free City of States and territories established in 1920 League of Nations mandates 1920 establishments in Europe 1939 disestablishments in Europe Holocaust locations in Poland Former countries of the interwar period States and territories disestablished in 1939 Former republics City-states

Overview

Establishment

Periods of independence and autonomy

Territory

Polish rights declared by Treaty of Versailles

League of Nations High Commissioners

State Constabulary

Population

Notable people born in the Free City of Danzig

Religion

Regional Synodal Federation of the Free City of Danzig

Diocese of Danzig of the Roman Catholic Church

Jewish Danzigers

Politics

Government

Foreign relations

German-Polish tensions

Danzig crisis

Second World War and aftermath

Origin of the post-war population

In fiction

See also

References

Further reading

External links